Caritas Christi Urget Nos

Tag: darkness

  • Monday of the Fifth Week of Ordinary Time

    Monday of the Fifth Week of Ordinary Time

    Today’s readings

    Have you ever felt like you were dwelling in a dark cloud?  I think most of us get there at some point or another in our lives.  The dark cloud might be confusion: where is God taking me?  What am I supposed to do with my life?  Or it might be frustration: why is this happening to me?  Why can’t I ever have a moment’s happiness or peace?  The dark cloud could be fear: what is happening to me?  Will this illness be curable or have I come to the end of my life?  The dark cloud is sometimes sadness, or loneliness, or despair.  Whatever the dark cloud looks like, we all get to pass through it at some time or another in our lives.

    The good news that we have from today’s Liturgy of the Word is that God is in the dark cloud too.  St. John of the Cross often wrote of what he called the “dark night of the soul” and once said that darkness “signifies the obscurity of faith with which the divinity is clothed while communicating itself to the soul.”  God comes to us even in the dark cloud, with a message of some kind.  What we learn in that period of darkness could be anything, but it invariably brings us closer to the light.

    Today, if you’re in the dark cloud, know that God is there with you.  Thrashing around wildly in the cloud trying to find him isn’t real productive.  But being still within it, listening for God’s voice, waiting for his presence in stillness, he will come to you.  For those outside the cloud this morning, our prayer is with our brothers and sisters who are in it, that they may know that God is there with them, in the dark cloud, helping them to learn what is beneficial to the soul, waiting for them to come to the true light.

  • Advent Penance Service

    Advent Penance Service

    I know a lot of people who get depressed this time of year.  Probably you do too.  Many people are missing loved ones who are far away from home, or who have passed away.  Some of my friends have a touch of seasonal affective disorder, and so they are depressed when we don’t see the sun as much on cloudy days like today, or when it gets dark so early as it does during this time.  Some people also look back on another year almost finished, and they lament what could have been, or what actually has been.  If there is any reason for being a little depressed at this time of year, it often seems like the joy that other people are experiencing during the Christmas season makes the pain even worse.

    So for whatever reason, many of us experience darkness during this season, when so many seem to be rejoicing in light.  In essence, that’s what Advent is all about.  The season of Advent recognizes the darkness of the world – the physical darkness, sure, but more than that the darkness of a world steeped in sin, a world marred by war and terrorism, an economy decimated by greed, peacefulness wounded by hatred, crime and dangers of all sorts.  This season of Advent also recognizes the darkness of our own lives – sin that has not been confessed, relationships broken by self-interest, personal growth tabled by laziness and fear.

    Advent says that God meets all that darkness head-on.  We don’t cower in the darkness; neither do we try to cover over the light.  Instead we put the lamp on a lampstand and shine the light into every dark corner of our lives and our world.  Isaiah prophesies about this Advent of light: “The light of the moon will be like that of the sun, and the light of the sun will be seven times greater [like the light of seven days].”  This is a light that changes everything.  It doesn’t just expose what’s imperfect and cause shame, instead it burns the light of God’s salvation into everything and everyone it illumines, making all things new.

    Our Church makes the light present in many ways – indeed, it is the whole purpose of the Church to shine a bright beacon of hope into a dark and lonely world.  We do that in symbolic ways: the progressive lighting of the Advent wreath symbolizes the world becoming lighter and lighter as we approach the birthday of our Savior.  But the Church doesn’t leave it simply in the realm of symbol or theory.  We are here tonight to take on that darkness and shine the light of Christ into every murky corner of our lives.  The Sacrament of Penance reconciles us with those we have wronged, reconciles us with the Church, and reconciles us most importantly with our God.  The darkness of broken relationships is completely banished with the Church’s words of absolution.  Just like the Advent calendars we’ve all had reveal more and more with every door we open, so the Sacrament of Penance brings Christ to fuller view within us whenever we let the light of that sacrament illumine our darkness.

    And so that’s why we’re here tonight.  We receive the light by being open to it and accepting it, tonight in a sacramental way.  Tonight, as we did at our baptism, we reject the darkness of sin and we “look east” as the hymn says, to accept the light of Christ which would dawn in our hearts.  Tonight we lay before our God everything that is broken in us, we hold up all of our darkness to be illumined by the light of God’s healing mercy.

    Each of the days of Advent, we have been praying the “O Antiphons” which the Church gives us in Evening prayer each day.  Yesterday’s “O Antiphon” spoke of the light we celebrate tonight: “O Radiant Dawn, splendor of eternal light, sun of justice: come, shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death.”

    Tonight, our sacrament disperses the gloomy clouds of our sin and disperses the dark shadows of death that lurk within us.  The darkness in and around us is no match for the light of Christ.  As we approach Christmas, that light is ever nearer.  Jesus is, as the Gospel of John tells us, “the light that shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”

  • Monday of the Fourth Week of Advent: O Radiant Dawn

    Monday of the Fourth Week of Advent: O Radiant Dawn

    Today’s readings

    There’s a little more light today.  As we get toward these last days of Advent, we find ourselves in a time when more light is beginning to shine.  All of the candles on our Advent wreath are lit, and the only thing that can make it brighter is the coming of our God in all his glory, dawning brightly on the earth.

    Today’s “O Antiphon” tells us as much.  Today we hear “O Radiant Dawn,” and the antiphon for Evening prayer is this: “O Radiant Dawn, splendor of eternal light, sun of justice: come, shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death.”

    This light is the source of the joy of which Zephaniah the prophet speaks today.  He tells the broken people Israel that God has forgiven their sins, and that he continues to walk among them, which should be cause enough to remove their fear.  That enduring presence among the people Israel, of course, is a foretaste of the enduring presence that we experience in the Incarnation of Christ.

    Mary and Elizabeth celebrate that light in today’s Gospel.  Mary’s greeting of Elizabeth is an act of hospitality, and Elizabeth’s welcome, along with the Baptist’s reaction in his mother’s womb, is an act of faith.  That faith incredibly affected the salvation of the whole world.

    And all of this light continues to shine on our sometimes-dark world.  A world grown dark and cold in sin is visited by its creator, and that world is changed forever.  The darkness can never now be permanent.  Sin and death no longer have the last word for us, because that was never God’s will for us.  We have hope for eternal life because our God eagerly desires us to return to him and be one with him.

    And so we pray, Come, O Radiant Dawn, shatter the darkness that sometimes reigns in our cynical world.  Give us the warmth of your light to warm our hearts grown cold with sin.  Shine on all who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death.  Come, Lord Jesus.  Come quickly and do not delay!

  • Friday of the First Week of Advent

    Friday of the First Week of Advent

    Today’s readings

    We are approaching one of the darkest times of the year.  I think that’s why we so desperately need Advent.  If we didn’t have the hope of a light that could shatter the darkest of darkness, winter would be much more ponderous than it already is.

    There are all kinds of darkness in our lives as the calendar year comes to a close, too.  I remember a time many years ago, I went into a store here in Glen Ellyn around this time of year.  It was all decked out for Christmas and had that kind of subdued lighting that is supposed to make you feel all Christmassy.  But all I experienced was a darkness and a gloom that made me have to run out of the store immediately.  I later realized that it was because I was still grieving the death of my grandmother, and the approaching holidays made that so much more difficult for me.

    There’s all kinds of darkness: grief, broken relationships, a feeling of being adrift in your life, sadness over patterns of sin or addictions.  And it seems like this time of year, as the year comes to a close, as the days become shorter and the nights are darker, that some of us might feel the darkness more poignantly than at other times.  I think that’s very natural.

    It’s a good thing, then, that we have a hope that cannot be taken away and a Light that can pierce any darkness.  We might cry out like the blind men, “Son of David, have pity on us!”  It might not happen all at once as it did for the blind men in the Gospel, but we do have hope that our darkness will be made light.  Because “out of gloom and darkness,” Isaiah tells us, “the eyes of the blind shall see.”

    That’s why we light our Advent candles here in Church.  Every week, the darkness is illumined just a little more, one candle at a time.  Our life can be like that too if we have the faith that Christ can be our Light, even in our darkest times.  As the Psalmist says, “The LORD is my light and my salvation; of whom should I be afraid?”

  • Tuesday of Holy Week

    Tuesday of Holy Week

    Today’s readings

    “And it was night.” In John’s Gospel, sentences like that are not given merely to tell the time of day. John’s Gospel is filled with images of light and darkness, light of course representing Christ and darkness representing evil. To say “And it was night” for John means that this was the hour that darkness would take its best shot at the light. And it will be very dark, leading to Jesus’ suffering and death. But in the end, no darkness can overcome the light of Christ. These are the days when we move somberly to the Cross, but in our moving toward it, we know that it is not the end of the story. It will not be night forever. The light will break into the darkness, leading us all to glorious day.

  • Advent Penance Service

    Advent Penance Service

    Readings: Isaiah 61:1-3, Matthew 9:1-8

    advent-candles-mThis afternoon I was thinking about the fact that people don’t experience things in the same way.  I was in downtown Naperville with my sister, my two nieces and my nephew.  We were out having lunch and doing some Christmas shopping just as the weather was getting pretty nasty.  My sister and I were probably not having as much fun trudging through the snow as Danny and Molly, whose attention I could not get because they were absolutely transfixed by the beauty of the snow.  One person’s hassle is another’s delight – especially when the other ones are three and four years old!

    I know a lot of people who get depressed this time of year.  Probably you do too.  Many people are missing loved ones who are far away from home, or who have passed away.  Some of my friends have a touch of seasonal affective disorder, and so they are depressed when we don’t see the sun as much on cloudy days like today, or when it gets dark so early as it does during this time.  Some people also look back on another year almost finished, and they lament what could have been, or what actually has been.  If there is any reason for being a little depressed at this time of year, it often seems like the joy that other people are experiencing during the Christmas season makes the pain even worse.

    So for whatever reason, many of us experience darkness during this season, when so many seem to be rejoicing in light.  In essence, that’s what Advent is all about.  The season of Advent recognizes the darkness of the world – the physical darkness, sure, but more than that the darkness of a world steeped in sin, a world marred by war and terrorism, an economy decimated by greed, peacefulness wounded by hatred, crime and dangers of all sorts.  This season of Advent also recognizes the darkness of our own lives – sin that has not been confessed, relationships broken by self-interest, personal growth tabled by laziness and fear.

    Advent says that God meets all that darkness head-on.  “Rise and walk.” “Your sins are forgiven.” And just like the paralytic, we are healed not just of our noticeable infirmities, but more so of our inner woundedness.  We, like that paralytic in the Gospel tonight, are completely healed – from the inside out.  The darkness of our world and the darkness of our hearts are absolutely no match for God’s light.  In another place, Isaiah prophesies about this Advent of light: “The light of the moon will be like that of the sun, and the light of the sun will be seven times greater [like the light of seven days].”

    Our Church makes the light present in many ways – indeed, it is the whole purpose of the Church to shine a bright beacon of hope into a dark and lonely world.  We do that in symbolic ways: the progressive lighting of the Advent wreath symbolizes the world becoming lighter and lighter as we approach the birthday of our Savior.  But the Church doesn’t leave it simply in the realm of symbol or theory.  We are here tonight to take on that darkness and shine the light of Christ into every murky corner of our lives.  The Sacrament of Penance reconciles us with those we have wronged, reconciles us with the Church, and reconciles us most importantly with our God.  The darkness of broken relationships is completely banished with the Church’s words of absolution.  Just like the Advent calendars we’ve all had reveal more and more with every door we open, so the Sacrament of Penance brings Christ to fuller view within us whenever we let the light of that sacrament illumine our darkness.

    And so that’s why we’re here tonight.  In our first reading, Isaiah comes to proclaim “a year of favor from the Lord.”  We can receive that favor, that light, by being open to it and accepting it, tonight in a sacramental way.  Tonight we lay before our God everything that is broken in us, we hold up all of our darkness to be illumined by the light of God’s healing mercy.

    The wonderful hymn, “O Come, O Come Emmanuel” speaks of the light that is to come to us:

    O come, Thou Day-Spring, come and cheer
    Our spirits by Thine advent here
    Disperse the gloomy clouds of night
    And death’s dark shadows put to flight.
    Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
    Shall come to thee, O Israel.

    Tonight, our sacrament disperses the gloomy clouds of our sin and disperses the dark shadows of death that lurk within us.  The darkness in and around us is no match for the light of Christ.  As we approach Christmas, that light is ever nearer.  Jesus is, as the Gospel of John tells us, “the light that shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”

  • Fourth Sunday of Advent: O Oriens

    Fourth Sunday of Advent: O Oriens

    Today’s readings

    I was with some friends the other night and we watched the Patrick Stewart version of “A Christmas Carol.”  When I watched it this time, I was really struck by the themes of light and darkness that Charles Dickens wrote into the story.  At the beginning, the setting is a very dark London, which at that time was certainly polluted with a lot of coal smog.  The opening settings are at night, and so there is a whole lot of darkness as the story begins.  Then, as this particular movie portrayed it, the three haunting spirits showed progressively less light as the story goes along.  The first spirit is so bright that he practically blinds Mr. Scrooge, and at the end of their time together, Scrooge actually snuffs him out with a bucket.  The second spirit is not quite so bright, but does appear with a torch to light the way.  By the end of their time together, the second spirit has grown old and is dying out.  Finally, the third spirit appears and is darkness itself.  All you can even see of him are two haunting, glowing eyes.

    The significance of that light and darkness really struck me, because, who hasn’t noticed that there is a lot more darkness this time of year?  I know a lot of people who get depressed this time of year.  Probably you do too – maybe you’re even one of them.  Many people are missing loved ones who are far away from home, or who have passed away.  Some of my friends have a touch of seasonal affective disorder, and so they are depressed when we don’t see the sun as much on cloudy day, or when it gets dark so early as it does during this time.  Some people also look back on another year almost finished, and they lament what could have been, or what actually has been.  And if there is any reason for being a little depressed at this time of year, it often seems like the joy that other people are experiencing during the Christmas season makes the pain even worse.

    So for whatever reason, many of us experience darkness during this season, when so many seem to be rejoicing in light.  In essence, that’s what Advent is all about; that’s what we have been celebrating these past few weeks.  The season of Advent recognizes the darkness of the world – the physical darkness, sure, but more than that, the darkness of a world steeped in sin, a world marred by war and terrorism, an economy decimated by greed, peacefulness wounded by hatred, crime and dangers of all sorts.  This season of Advent also recognizes the darkness of our own lives – sin that has not been confessed, relationships broken by self-interest, personal growth tabled by laziness and fear.

    Advent says that God meets all that darkness head-on.  The prophet Isaiah prophesies about this Advent of light: “The light of the moon will be like that of the sun, and the light of the sun will be seven times greater [like the light of seven days].”  Our reading of the Annunciation in today’s Gospel is a celebration of that light breaking through our darkness:  “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you!”  “Do not be afraid, you have found favor with God!”  “May it be done to me according to your word!”

    Our Church makes the light present in many ways – indeed, it is the whole purpose of the Church to shine a bright beacon of hope into a dark and lonely world.  We do that in symbolic ways: the progressive lighting of the Advent wreath symbolizes the world becoming lighter and lighter as we approach the birthday of our Savior.  But the Church doesn’t leave it simply in the realm of symbol or theory.  We are here at Mass every week to celebrate that the darkness has not overcome the bright light of Christ in our world.  Our God has become one of us, taking our form, healing our brokenness, redeeming our sinfulness and leading us to eternal life in his kingdom of light.

    The incarnation of Christ, which we’ll celebrate in just a few short days, is perhaps the central mystery of our faith.  If we don’t have the incarnation – God taking flesh and dwelling among us – then we never have the Cross, we never have the Resurrection, and we never have eternal life.  Indeed the incarnation is such a beacon of hope, such a beautiful, central mystery, that the mere mention of us calls us to bow in adoration and gratitude for the grace we have been given.

    Whenever we do something in the Mass, there’s a reason for it, and it often tells us something about what we believe.  That is why we bow when, during the Creed, we pray: “by the power of the Holy Spirit, He was born of the Virgin Mary, and became man.”  In fact, on Christmas, we’re actually supposed to genuflect at those words.

    And so, without denying that there is darkness, we boldly proclaim that there’s a little more light today.  The dark injustices of our world are evident; wars rage, terrorism breaks our peacefulness, greed brings recession, crime proliferates.  But it does not overcome: there’s a little more light today.  The darkness of our sin cannot be denied: lack of prayer leads us further away from God, self-interest clouds our relationships and weakens our discipleship.  But it does not overcome: there’s a little more light today.

    The light comes from one and only one place: Jesus Christ.  He is the one who banishes our darkness and bathes the world in the glory of his wonderful light.  His coming two thousand years ago changed the course of our history.  His coming again will bring all of creation to completion in the light of God’s everlasting kingdom.

    Each of the days from December 17th through the 23rd has a specific antiphon assigned to it; these are called the “O Antiphons” and they speak of a special title of Jesus.  Today’s “O Antiphon” is “O Oriens” which is translated “O Radiant Dawn” or “O Morning Star” or “O Dayspring.” Corresponding to the day’s “O Antiphon” is the antiphon for evening prayer, and that antiphon today is this: “O Radiant Dawn, splendor of eternal light, sun of justice: come, shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death.”

    In addition, a verse of “O Come, O Come Emmanuel” corresponds to the daily “O Antiphon.” Today’s verse speaks of the light that is to come to us:

    O come, Thou Day-Spring, come and cheer
    Our spirits by Thine advent here
    Disperse the gloomy clouds of night
    And death’s dark shadows put to flight.
    Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
    Shall come to thee, O Israel.

    And the Liturgy for Christmas states emphatically that there is more light because of the birth of Jesus.  The preface to the Eucharistic prayer says, “In the wonder of the incarnation, your eternal Word has brought to the eyes of faith a new and radiant vision of your glory.  In him we see our God made visible and so are caught up in love of the God we cannot see.”

    In these final days of Advent, we need to be proclaiming that there is more light today.  We need to show all the world that new and radiant vision of God’s glory.  The Gospel of John wraps this up for us very nicely: “the light that shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”

    At the end of the story, Mr. Scrooge is a changed man.  And the setting has changed too: he realizes that all of the spirits visited him in that one very dark night, and as he throws open the shutters, he is awakened by the bright light of Christmas morning.  He then sets about making things right with Bob Cratchit, his nephew Fred, and anyone he can find.  There is a lot more light for Scrooge on that wonderful Christmas morning.  As his nephew says at the end of the story: “and it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge.  May that be truly said of us, and all of us!  And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God Bless Us, Every One!”

  • Thursday of the Eighth Week of Ordinary Time

    Thursday of the Eighth Week of Ordinary Time

    Today's readings

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    One of the voices that can never be silenced in us is the voice that cries out seeking to see.  We spend our whole lives crying out as Bartimaeus in today’s Gospel: “Master, I want to see.”  And just as the crowd and even the disciples could not silence his desires, so nothing will silence that desire in our own hearts and souls.  We want to see the truth, we want to see Jesus, we want to see the world as it really is, we want to see our way out of our current messed-up situation, we want to see the end of suffering, we want to see peace, we want to see wholeness, and maybe most of all we want to see ourselves.  As we really are.  As God sees us.  This is our lifelong task.St. Augustine spoke of that very same task in his Confession.  He said, speaking to God: “I will confess, therefore, what I know of myself, and also what I do not know.  The knowledge that I have of myself, I possess because you have enlightened me; while the knowledge of myself that I do not yet possess will not be mine until my darkness shall be made as the noonday sun before your face.”  He goes on to say that he can try to hide from God if he wanted to, but it would never work.  Hiding from God would only result in hiding God from himself.  God sees the depths of our being, so if we try to hide all we really end up doing is running away from God who knows us at our very core.The writer of our first reading had this idea in mind when he said:
    You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood,
    a holy nation, a people of his own,
    so that you may announce the praises of him
    who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.

    God is calling us all out of darkness today.  He wants us to see him, and ourselves, as we were created to be.  He wants us to be a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people of his own.  He created us from glory.  And we won’t experience that glory until we go through the rather painful experience of bringing all of our darkness out into the light.  Maybe we’re not ready for that yet.  But we can pray to become ready, and to be open.  We can pray in the words of Bartimaeus: “Master, I want to see!”